Artisan Entrepreneurs in Cairo and Early Modern Capitalism (1600-1800)

Nelly Hanna

Publication Year: 2011

Little has been written about the economic history of Egypt prior to its incorporation into the European capitalist economy. While historians have mined archives and court documents to create a picture of the commercial activities, networks, and infrastructure of merchants during this time, few have documented a similar picture of the artisans and craftspeople. Artisans outnumbered merchants, and their economic weight was considerable, yet details about their lives, the way they carried out their work, and their role or position in the economy are largely unknown. Hanna seeks to redress this gap with Artisan Entrepreneurs in Cairo and Early Modern Capitalism (1600–1800) by locating and exploring the role of artisans in the historical process. Offering richly detailed portraits as well as an overview of the Ottoman Empire’s economic landscape, Hanna incorporates artisans into the historical development of the period, portraying them in the context of their work, their families, and their social relations. These artisans developed a variety of capitalist practices, both as individuals and collectively in their guilds. Responding to the demands of expanding commercial environments in Egypt and Europe, artisans found ways to adapt both production techniques and the organization of production. Hanna details the ways in which artisans defied the constraints of the guilds and actively engaged in the markets of Europe, demonstrating how Egyptian artisan production was able to compete and survive in a landscape of growing European trade.

cover

Front Matter

Contents

Acknowledgments

In the course of the past six years during which this book was in the making,
I have accumulated debts to a number of colleagues and friends who in various
ways have helped me in the process. Suraiya Faroqhi read the manuscript
and not only gave me several important suggestions but also sent me a series of...

1 Defining a Framework for the Economic History
of Early-Modern Egypt

In studies of the economy, historians know in a general way much more
about commerce and trade in medieval or early-modern societies (1500–1800)
than they do about the agricultural or industrial sectors. Th is holds true for both
Europe and the Ottoman Empire.1 In various parts of the world, merchants left...

The decades between the end of the sixteenth century and the mid–
seventeenth century experienced a considerable level of commercial activity, in
part linked to more intense global trading, and this activity resulted in a certain
level of commercialization. Here I examine some of the features of this trade...

3 A Period of Unprecedented Social Mobility for Nonelites

In the latter part of the seventeenth century, artisans in general and
entrepreneurs in particular confronted two broad trends, both of which affected
their lives and their work. Following a period of recession in midcentury, there
were more trade and an expansion of economic resources, on the one hand,...

4 The Jalfis: Oil Pressers and Emirs

Examining the life of the oil presser Ahmad al-Jalfi (c. 1650–1707) illustrates
the social mobility of this period. It shows both Jalfi’s horizontal mobility
as he moved in different economic spheres and his vertical mobility to a position
of wealth and status. It also shows that in spite of this mobility, he remained...

5 Competition Between Different Forms of Capitalism

Between the end of the seventeenth century and the mid–eighteenth century,
the mamluks became more involved in the economy, attempting with variable
degrees of success to have a say or to penetrate and at times to control trade
and production. Some of them created capitalist networks linking agricultural...

6 Guilds: Moving Between Traditional and Precapitalist Structures

In the eighteenth century, some artisans confronted developments
that were neither of their doing nor in their favor, but with which they had to live.
Not all artisans were aff ected in the same way or to the same degree, nor were the
strategies that they formulated uniform—quite the contrary. Yet one can trace...

7 Conclusion: What Remained of Artisan Entrepreneurship
a Hundred Years Later?

At the theoretical level, this book has formulated a framework for
the economy of the period from 1600 to 1800 that broadly made use of the world
systems approach and adapted it to the conditions of the region and the period
under study. It argues that the expansion of world trade currents aff ected aspects...

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